Petex Fusion
by archivewriter3
Summary: Vance lives in a world where there are creatures made of physical manifestations of energy called Petex. He finds a rare Myth Petex and realizes that his destiny is not as bleak as he thought; he will wield power beyond his wildest dreams, form bonds that will last a lifetime and be involved in a plot that can either save his world or end it... Contains Archive
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

Vance lived in Highland Town in the country-state of Unioven. The settlement was one of the highest points on the map habitable by humans, which did give them a lot of Electrogen benefits. That was at the cost of thin air.

The 16 year old groaned as he got up from his brown sofa bed; the gift from the furniture maker in town for having to face the Forest thrice in order to get enough firewood for him. Pretty well earned, in his opinion. He still had the claw marks across his arms to prove that.

Taking in the look of the tiny apartment with only two rooms; a bathroom and a living room, one might think that he was poor and must've had bad fortune. To him, he would consider himself very lucky. He didn't remember much about the past, but he was told that he was dropped off in the town square and left there to freeze to death. He was a newborn; probably some teen that decided to get rid of her problem. An elderly man that had passed away a year ago; Mr. Bakersfield, took him in as his own, and that was where Vance's life began.

 _ **Back to the present,**_ he said to himself, shaking off those thoughts as he folded up the bed and got to work.

The sparsely furnished room was a hodgepodge of stuff. Where he couldn't afford to get a TV, there was a full-body mirror from Mrs. Bakersfield that he couldn't pawn for the life of him. Said mirror was now the object of his attention as he walked up to it and tried to look as presentable as possible; he had woken up a few hours before and had prepped himself to go before those _things_ appeared.

He wore a black T-shirt with a long sleeved denim jacket over it. His black, crew cut hair we're the same colour as his eyes. Looking down...

"Ugh... Again..." He groaned, realizing he wasn't in anything other than his underwear.

His denim trousers were quickly put on alongside his grey and pink sneakers with pink laces. Hey, he couldn't be judged; it was a free world. Besides the fact that the shoes were a gift from a neighbor whose daughter had ran away from home.

The _third_ time.

This week.

Shaking his head at the thought of the silly teen camping out in the forest for a while, risking her life because of some stupid tantrum, Vance walked out of his humble abode, heading towards Zenith Forest.

As he walked down Steep Lane, he remembered what he was sent to do. His boss and mentor; Professor Igneous- strange name, but not the worst he had heard- had sent him to collect a package from the porters in Piershore. Suddenly, he broke into a run, right after hearing particularly harsh chirping coming from the forest.

"Damn it! Those things are active earlier than usual!" He cursed under his breath, willing himself to run faster. With any luck, he might just swoop through without a confrontation.

Vance knew that while Petex didn't need to sleep, they could still do so, but only opted to do so to reduce the amount of constant energy they expend. If a Petex extended too much energy, it would revert to its most basic form to try and make up for it, only changing back when more energy was available. If even in those forms they over exerted, they eventually but suddenly disintegrated... Into nothing; the remaining structure of the cube like bits would simply disappear., Wasted by the elements.

The Thornbristle Sparrows that occupied the forest had other ideas.

"Oh, crap."

Three of the Petex were chasing him, smoky, curling trails of cubex leading him to believe they had either recently been reenergized, or spawned.

 _ **Huh. Noobs?! This might work, after all!**_

Vance dodged around trees in an attempt to shake them, but he only got scratches and prickly fly-bys for his trouble.

Then he saw a glimmer of fire.

"Hey! Anybody!" He yelled as he ran towards the source of the flame. He didn't notice that the birds had started pulling back as he got closer. Something at the back of his mind told him that the fire was dangerous, but he needed help.

When he stumbled into the small clearing, what he saw wasn't a fire, but a Petex.

It was a red quadruped draconic Petex with red, leathery skin. It's stocky hind legs were a bit bigger than the fores to let it stand upright if it wanted to. The legs were tipped with three white claws and cream soles. It's relatively long arms had three sharp claws as well. Its underside was cream colored and it had a slightly long snout. It's eyes were shut, but one didn't have to look far to find the source of the flame.

Its smoldering back of ridged spikes had flame on them, all the way to the tip of its tail, which had a little 'devil' arrow. Its relatively small wings also had small ridges of flaming scales on little rivets.

"What the-!"Vance began, shutting up as percing yellow eyes snapped open and the Petex snarled at him.

"Okay, I'll just, be going now..." He said, backing away.

Only when he felt the prickle of poisoned thorns sticking on his jacket did he realized it wasn't safe.

"Damnit..." He was stuck between a rock and a relatively hard place. By the Petex's laboured breathing and it's momentary pixelating and realizing, he figured that it had run dangerously low on Electrogen.

"Hm..." He took a gamble and dropped to his hands and knees, crawling forward and trying to be as docile as possible.

The little dragon seemed to get it, because it looked at him with a tired look and closed it's eyes. When Vance breathed a sigh of relief, the eyes snapped open again, only to close.

Vance just had a dumb idea, and it might either save him, or damn him.

Mustering up his courage, Vance made the most threatening yell he had ever made in his life, spooking the Petex and the Thornbristles. Without warning, he grabbed the dragon and bolted like he was being pursued by the devil.

The little dragon which acted so tough was paralysed with shock as it stiffly let the human carry it. Its eyes were wide and it constantly looked at the human's face to see if any hostility would emerge. He knew a single attack would disintegrate him, and he didn't want that, so he stayed still.

Meanwhile, Vance was ducking and weaving and bobbing and barrel- rolling to avoid the hail of thorns, claws and beaks that had become eight of the Thornbristles.

Suddenly one appeared from only God-knows- where and rushed him. The Petex got so up close and personal that Vance had a precious second to assess it.

It was an avian sparrow-looking Petex that was very small, around a foot high. It had rough green plumage surrounding it's head and three tail feathers underneath three tail leaves. It also had bright green feathers on it's back with a beige underside with light brown down. It sported a yellow hooked beak and beady black eyes. The most interesting part of it were it's wings; They sprouted green spikes from every feather. The feathers shared their space with leaves that made up the secondaries of the bird Petex's wing.

"Scree!" It screeched, flapping it's wings twice and producing a volley of Poison Thorns that lodged deep in the ground where Vance stood a moment ago.

He had sidestepped the volley, but that gave an opening for two of the ravenous Petex to straighten their wings and slash at him with them. Botano Cubex mixed with the Electrogen in the air and the Nature Wind Slash was used.

The double attack cut into his back through his jacket. Thankfully no Irradia/Gamma Cubex was used, or he might be in trouble.

Ignoring the pain as best he could, Vance continued running, but he started to falter as his vision became blurry from blood loss.

"I think, this is it..." He groaned, stumbling.

He emerged from the forest with a little shout before flopping facefirst into the ground. He released the Petex from his hold before he fell, and it was now nudging him, wondering why it had stopped.

The little dragon huffed a little as it saw that the human had taken damage on its account. It was meant to be strong...

No more.

The tiny two foot tall dragon crawled over to the human's palm and nuzzled into it, feeling warmth leave it. Its last thoughts were along the line of "I hope I won't regret this..." Before it disintegrated.

The Electrogen in the blazing red Cubex flowed like a river of flame into the human's palm, burning a mark there and entering his body. The cubes then turned blue and inert.

With a cough, Vance stood up. He felt better than before, for some reason. Like the wound on his back didn't matter.

A screech reminded him how he even got those marks. He looked back at the Thornbristles and noticed that only a few of them were slowly venturing out of the few protective trees left of the forest cover.

He noticed another look he got. The same look they gave him when they kept away from the Petex.

They were afraid.

With a grunt, he flipped the birds the bird and looked for his cargo. When he saw the Cubex on the ground his eyes widened in realization.

Electrogen was used by humans as well. It was in their blood, making then able to function in nearly superhuman ways before the Great War. Humans didn't have to take shots of the substance anymore because they all had access to an increased immune system, resistance to pain, denser body structure, sharper senses, etc.

A boost of it passed the treshold, but it was like caffeine that burnt like cotton.

"Gotta move, fast!"

He ignored the little jolts his body sent him as he scooped up the mass of Cubex. Once or twice a Thornbristle would squawk, but a snarl from the human shut them up. When he was done, with Cubex in his trouser pockets and jacket, he took off with a burst of speed.

The ground thundered as he ran like the wind. The Boost had nearly given him wings! He felt invincible as he ran, jumping over boulders like they were fences and leaping over tributary rivers they were little streams of water. He never stopped moving until he evened out in the last stretch of land leading to Hope's Point.

 **Timeskip**

The Outpost security lookout looked from the tower with a bit of wonder. He was seeing a light dust cloud moving towards the town and first thought that a wild Petex was rampaging towards them, but he quickly found out it was a human teenager that was hauling ass incredibly fast.

He alerted the guards down as to what was happening and one jumped on a Hovercycle and zoomed off to meet him.

As soon as the guard met the teenager, he grabbed him as the Boost wore off and the kid collapsed in his arms.

"Reenergize this..." Vance groaned, pulling off his jacket and losing consciousness...

 **I'll end it here, cause, who doesn't like minor cliffhangers!**

 **I'm eeeevilll. Deal with it.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

When Vance came too, he first saw a white ceiling and a fan blowing cool air onto his face and body.

 _ **Hm. Nice fan. Wait a sec, I don't HAVE a fan!**_ Vance thought lucidly until he realized that he wasn't in his room.

He sat up with a start and was immediately wracked with weakness and pain in his back and allover his body. With a groan, he fell back unto the bed as the memories of all that had happened came back.

"I gotta... Go..." He groaned, trying to get up, but failing again.

After a few tries, he gave up and decided to look around him.

He was in a small and simple furnished hospital room colored cream. It had two windows that had been slightly closed because of the ruckus that was Piershore and two sky blue beds with fluffy white duvets and pillows.

Just then, a young nurse-scratch that, she was right around his age- in an walked in briskly and perked right up once she saw that her patient was awake.

"You're awake! Sit and relax; the Electrogen bandages have to do their work." She said, placing her hands on Vance's shoulders and lightly pushing him back down from his sitting position.

"Uh, wait a second-" Vance began, resisting her efforts.

 _"Down."_ The nurse commanded with a dark tone.

Later, Vance would remember the minute red spark in her brown eyes that oozed a black haze.

Right now, he was scared stiff and lay down without a single complaint. He did feel the sting of the wounds on his back and groaned a bit.

"Turn over. I want to check them."

He did as he was told and soonnfelt a shiver as the bandages were slowly peeled back to reveal an 'X' on his back which had pink energy flowing on it's surface. The Electrogen stitched away, closing the wound up before her eyes.

Satisfied with the progress, the nurse stepped back out.

"If you need anything, just call. The button on your bed is for that."

With a turn off her head which briefly exposed the black bangs that framed her face, the nurse walked out, and Vanve was left alone to heal.

As soon as she left, the fear he had dissipated and he decided to sit up again. He had to get the package before the Porters left for their ship.

 _ **Come on, HEAL FASTER!**_

With a jolt, his back felt like it was on fire.

"Gaaah!" Vance yelled, forsaking sitting for dropping to the floor back first to roll.

When that didn't work, Vance dragged himself back to his bed and reached out for the remote, which he pressed with a grunt, and promptly lost consciousness.

When he came to again, he was still in the hospital, but the place was considerably brighter. A cross check at the clock showed that it was 8:45 am.

Strangely, he felt very well rested, apart from a minor headache. Even his back-his BACK!

Vance tried to get up, but a hand was placed on his shoulder, stopping him. It was the nurse.

"Your back is fine. Too fine, I might add. It's completely healed. There's no reason for you to stay here any longer, so if you come with me now, we'll get you discharged."

After that, she walked out of the room to give him some privacy as Vance grabbed his clothes from a chair in a closet on the wall and put them on.

When he walked out, he walked down the white corridors, following the teenage nurse to the register where he grudgingly paid for the treatment and was discharged.

 **Timeskip**

"Damnit all... Those stupid Petex have just put a hole in my pocket! If not for my mysterious healing, I would have been broke!" Vance growled as he jogged through Piershore, towards the Terminal.

He had decided that it would be okay to check on who he supposed mutually saved his life, so he asked around and got the location of he high tech building.

It was a story high with a small underground network as well, but the reinforced blue 'Genglass that covered the whole thing was impressive. The bulletproof, Cubex-resistant and explosion-nullifying plastic cost more than pure ingots of Electrogen, and that was a lot of zeroes.

There were a fire see-through parts of it to serve as windows, but since the place was fully air-conditioned and ventilated, there was really no need for real windows. It had two sliding doors of the same make that were at least 15 feet tall.

Vance slightly shivered as he entered the building, which blasted cool Electrogenated air in his face. He walked to the counter, where he saw an Attendant who was somewhere in her early twenties with her jet black hair in a bun, an ungodly shade and amount of pink that was woefully countered by her white beret, shoes and 'apron' and a blindingly bright smile- it actually had Vance flinch and look away for a second; he could have sworn the woman was glowing- who had just waved off two kids who held a little red ferret with them.

"Uh, hello? I'm here to collect a Petex. I assume a post guard dropped it off earlier today-gah!" He began, only to nearly leap backwards at the pink fire blazing in the woman's eyes as the shine around her became darker.

"So _you're_ the person who did not only push their Petex to the Absolute Limit, but couldn't even store hm in a containment device..." She said, her face and voice not masking the things Vance was seeing at all.

"N-no. You have it all wrong; I... Saved that Petex. Um, he was in the Zenith forest for some reason, and I saw the state he was in and decided to help. I swear, I'm telling the truth." Vance explained, almost adding '-please don't hurt me" to the end of that sentence but stopping himself in time.

The moment he said that, the dangerous feeling disappeared from her, and the cheerful disposition came back.

"Oh, sorry. In that case, follow Martha to the hall where your Petex has been kept." She said with another blinding smile.

As Vance walked away, rubbing his eyes, he started to feel strange. He felt something burning, but it was okay. Like a cheerful campfire next to him. He followed the feeling rather than the pink, child sized humanoid Petex called a Carie.

He arrived in a hall with several recovering Petex receiving Electrogen and Trainers helping their users relearn their techniques and commands.

There was a small pen for Petex who didn't want to be digitized, and there was the source of the campfire feeling.

The dragon Petex radiated warmth from its body, but for some reason the other Petex in the pen shied away from the warmth, sticking as far away as they could. Even the Carie didn't dare come close.

"We are here. Have a good day." The Carie said in her generic nurse voice, daintily fluttering away on her four translucent pixie wings.

The dragon Petex was just staring at all of the others with a half-snarl, but he perked right up once he felt the slow burn of his Linked. He immediately turned on a dime and flew at his Linked, tackling him to the ground.

"What the-OOF!"

Vance thought he was being attacked, but he looked up and saw the harmless puppy dog expression on the dragon's face as it cutely cocked its head to the side in confusion. He carefully stood and cradled the Petex in his arms, which made the mark on his palm burn.

"Gah!" He yelped, dropping the dragon, whose flames burned as he looked around for who had hurt his Linked.

Vance had never taken a look at the mark until now, but right now he could see it; an eighth pointed star burned into his right palm. It was too precise and stylized to be a mistake, and he wracked his brain for where he got it from, but he only drew a blank.

Until he saw the same star on the dragon's chest.

"You did this? That Boost was you, right?" He asked, crouching and presenting his palm to the Petex, whose eyes widened as he saw the Mark.

With a nod, the Petex raised itself onto its haunches and piffed out it's chest, which made contact with the Mark.

The pain immediately faded as Vance's head began to swim in all the Electrogen passing through and out of his body. It made him nauseous, and he didn't want to throw up, so he jerked his hand away.

"Wow..." A Trainer said, looking at them from a safe distance.

"Uh, what?" Vance asked, remembering where he was and standing, while the dragon flew up to his shoulder after slightly shrinking in size and stood there.

"Your Link, it's like REALLY strong." He said as he pressed a button on a black smart phone-like device.

A swirl of blue energy came out of a lens on the device and turned into Cubex, which swirled in a small cloud as it built up into a brown pangolin.

Just then Vance noticed the deep brown flare around the Petex that also jumped to the trainer, whose eyes looked like they were pouring out sand and smoke.

Rubbing his eyes, Vance looked again and saw nothing unusual.

"Uh, quick question. Do you see anything with me and... My Petex?"

The Trainer walked around an invisible circle around the two, but then shook his head.

"I can feel it, but not see it. Just like you, right?" He asked, looking up at them with his empty sand-pouring eyes.

"Yeah..."

Vance turned and walked away with the dragon on his shoulder, nearly forgetting that he needed to see the lightbulb of pink that was the attendant again. He went there and took a moment to adjust to the light, before looking at his dragon, whose eyes had glazed over slightly.

 _ **Lucky...**_ Vance thought, blinking a bit.

"Oh, it seems like you found him. I don't have you in the system, bit that's to be expected since you saved him. Are you a Traveller?"

Vance acted like he got struck by a lightning bolt when she said that word.

 _ **Traveller... I have a Petex, so I could be a Traveller, a Hunter, anything! This is happening all so fast... But wait. Didn't I have something to do before all this?**_

 _ **SHIT!**_

"Uh, nope, I'm not a Traveller. This is the first Petex I've ever had. Can I go now, I got some things to do." Vance spat out, nearly hopping in place as his mind raced on how to get to the port.

"(Giggle) Sure, you can go. Good luck, _Tamer._ " The attendant giggled as she waved him off and went back to typing on a laptop with a smile.

"Thanks!" He said as he zipped out of the doors, nearly hitting a few people on the way.

Something at the back of his mind nagged him about the last word that he had heard from her...

 _ **Tamer... I'm a Tamer? Is that why I'm seeing all this wierd stuff? But the Trainer couldn't see it... I think I have to talk to Iggy about this...**_


End file.
